The Ultimatum

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Drenka Balich delivered an ultimatum to her lover, the forgotten puppeteer Mickey Sabbath, in their hideaway Grotto on the anniversary of the beginning of this particular relationship. It was the week before Memorial Day and Drenka and Sabbath had been lovers for thirteen years. Each was married, Sabbath to Roseanna, and Drenka to Matija, an inn-keeper. The ultimatum Drenka delivered was to forswear fucking others or their affair was over. This statement baffled Sabbath because, while he currently wasn't sleeping with anyone else, he had always considered their affair to be based upon sexual freedom, a sort of "free love" form of adultery. His was not a monogamous nature. Drenka was somewhat of a prostitute to men who visited the inn (although Sabbath was the only one she accepted money from) and Sabbath enjoyed hearing about her conquests. She used his money to buy things for her son, Matthew, who had split with his father, Matija, when he chose to become a policeman instead of an innkeeper. Her parents were Tito Communists whose hearts were broken when Drenka married Matija, whose grandfather was imprisoned when he dared to discuss Tito's break with the Soviet Union openly. Sabbath's mother, dead now, still held an extreme importance for him. She had wasted away after the death of his brother, Morty. Now that she was dead, Sabbath believed he spoke with her more than when she was alive. Sabbath didn't understand why Drenka was so interested in monogamy all of a sudden. He was sixty-four and set in his ways. Now he began speaking in abstracts about sexual appetites and desires and healthy relationships. He finally agreed to her demand if she would agree to give her husband a blow job twice a week, knowing how repugnant this act was to her. She started sobbing and finally admitted to him that the reason for the ultimatum was that she had cancer and could be dead soon. She was dead in six months. (Part I of two parts.)